run for hope 2006

The weekend's been pretty full-on and fufilling! :)

First up, Saturday's finally the much awaited (but muchly dreaded the night before) Final Theory Test. Reading the highway code seemed easy enough, yet the practice questions asked were so out-of-the world (to me anyway) I got a ton of them wrong and was extremely discouraged. Long story short, I only got to bed at 3ish that night and had a token number of hours of sleep before I had to crawl out of bed unwillingly again. Urgh. Somehow I'd misjudged my timings and underestimated my shower time, so by the time my Dad gave me a ride to SSDC, I was approx 7minutes late.

Rightfully, late-comers aren't allowed to sit for the test, and the people there could get pretty nasty, but as I entered the room, the invigilator(?- what's he called anyway?) just asked for my I/C before handing me the slip of paper with my password on it. Thank God for that! For those who're in the "shading answers" era, theory tests are now computerized and touch-screen. And animated. There actually are videos to watch before answering various questions.

Also, I had the easiest set of 50 questions! No ridiculously crazy ones to baffle me with. It was a breeze! So I passed the test, glory be to God!

Then I made my way down to G2 to man the youth centre. It's a long story about this little girl who was so pitiful but there was not much I could do anyway :(

The kids there may be vulgar and all, but they do show you respect and I believe they are all good kids. There's an effort made when you tell them to "watch [their] language". I pray that as they spend a part of their weekdays/weekends at the centre, and relationships are forged, they may come to see Christ in us, and one day they will all come to know God, as their personal Lord and Savior. Amen.

We had a guest speaker, Ps Danny Chua, for YA service that evening and I thought the message was really good. "A broken heart". How you have to be broken before God can really use you.

Brokenness removes every man-made obstacle that separates us from our destiny. (Mark 2:1-8)
Brokenness releases passion that impacts the atmosphere. (John 12)
Brokenness reveals the glory of God in us and defeats the enemies. (Judges 7:15-23)

Pre-dinner was as usual, a long wait, but we finally headed to a not-happening-at-all secluded coffeeshop, at Justin's recommendation. Pre-dinner was full of chatter and laughter but once the food came, everyone just sunk their chops in, shut up, and chowed dinner down. Guess all was famished eh.

The array of lame jokes started coming back soon enough anyway. Not like we missed it haha. The boys are so corny! Haha. Haha. HAHA.

Anyways, took me a really long time to finally knock out in bed last night so I probably didn't get much sleep again. Set 2 alarms, with my brother's and my cellphone and even changed the alarm alert to some annoying, loud, and ah-beng sounding one in the hopes that I might get awaken. However, come 5am, I only heard my brother's cellphone. And I shut it off.

The next time I opened my eyes, it was -gasp- 6.40am! We were meeting at Habour Front at 7am!

Finally got to Tanjong Beach, ran the run in the rain- all 9km of it- with my running partner Joel! Who kept me very entertained for the whole 55minutes. He had comments about everyone, and various different ways to keep me going. It was quite funny. Initially we held a conversation. Gradually it was just Joel talking to me without a response. Hey man I had to sustain all my energy to complete the run! Haha.

"Ok next we gotta over take zhong guo mei!"
"Hey look it's Wild Wild West!"
"*points to neon green sports bra some girl was wearing* Eh look, glow in the dark one!"

Etc etc etc.

55minutes of Joel talking. (Thankfully he didn't break into a song.)

And what a good running companion! Apart from talking non-stop to me, he limits my water consumption at the water points! "TWO SIPS ONLY," after grabbing a (HUGE) cup for me. Then yanking the cup off when I had more than "TWO SIPS". "ENOUGH. NO MORE." Very fierce. Post-run also.

"EAT YOUR BANANAS."
"No I'll throw up."
"JUST A BIT. Later you cramp."

Then when we met back with Germ and Marshall, I had MORE pro-runners nagging at me! For my own good of course. Such wonderful running companions :) Thank you all! Really appreciate all that. It was a good run. Yes, unbelievable as it is, Cheryl ran all 9km! Heh.

Post-run saw a crowd of runners at the market at Harbour Front. Pigging out. LOL. We were uhh... guilty of that as well.

Chooped home to shower/change then head out to meet Yi and Grace, before we went for Shar's birthday high-tea party!

Food was great, people/company: priceless. What more can you ask for right? :) We played Polar Bear and ooh it's super fun. Somehow most of them was under the impression that I was the polar bear "behind that innocent face". WAH REALLY OK. Behind the sweet innocent smiley face I was really "pretty much innocent!" LOL.

Then... we played this game that requires a high level of concentration (which I don't have) and 0% blurness (which I'm no where near, sadly- hurhur excuses eh :p). SO, Sister Poh Suan, Sandra and myself ended up having to do a forfeit: go round the swimming pool proclaiming LOUDLY, "RAWWWWRRRRR I AM A POLAR BEAR!" many times. Thanks to stupid Jonathan. Haha but it was hilarious man.

Played that once more later on and I had to do a forfeit AGAIN. Shucks. Why always me!!!!! This time with Joel Tay. Posing as animals from the 12 Zodiac Signs for the camera (and the audience). Sigh...

Blackmailable pictures...

I'm home now and my right leg feels like dead. I think my right ankle is gone as well. And left knee. And how about both of them legs.

Thanks for the amazing party Sharon! :) Happy blessed 22nd birthday!


4 of us drenched after the run :)

(And my tee that resembles a rag after the run. Coz the sleeves were too long and wet and flapping against my arm so I had to roll them up right? But they wouldn't stay, so I was gripping on to them tightly throughout... Such that Joel said he heard a rip when we were running halfway LOL. And the good ol' pear gnawed on for the past 30 minutes.)


Germy, (Joel), and I on the way back to Harbour Front.